Shark Heart

by Emily Habeck

With electroreception, Lewis hoped to sense her, know her, and love her even thousands of miles away in the ocean. Nothing he read indicated that electroception extended further than a couple yards. But maybe, he thought, maybe if I practiced, I would never really have to say goodbye. When Lewis finally came to bed, he took sleeping Wren’s hand in his and closed his eyes, seeing if he could sense her electrical field. “What… What are you doing?” she asked groggily. “Just seeing what it’s like to love you when I can’t see you.”

I’ve had it wrong all along. If magic exists in a real way, it is not here to dazzle us with all that is unreal to the naked eye. What if magic is just mislabeled peace? A peace that says suffering doesn’t have a purpose or reason. A peace that says meaning is the medicine. A peace that says I don’t need to know how or why. But she’ll be all right. Wren will be okay.

Wren and the Tiny Pregnant Woman shared practical, applied interests like oncoming personal devastation, terrifying sadness, and the experience of free-falling into grief and the unknown.

Feelings fled under pressure; feelings did not light the darkness. What remained strong in the deep, the hard times, was love as an effort, a doing, a conscious act of will. Soulmates, like her and Lewis, were not theoretical and found. They were tangible, built.

He looked to Wren to remember. He always remembered Wren.

joy and grief are human birthrights, but mostly, being alive is everything in between.

Are we all just actors, performing some unbound art form for God, the audience of space? I wish I could have seen then what I know now. All along, I had the starring role.

He was an aimless kite in search of a string to ground him to the world, but instead, he’d found Wren, a great, strong wind who supported his exploration of the sky.

Then, for the last time, Lewis lifted his head and kissed her mouth: flower-petal lips to sharp teeth. “I love you,” he said, and mouthed, Goodbye. And in a breath, her arms were empty.

So she took a northern detour because returning home felt like a commitment to a life that could go on without him.

Just pulled over to nap, and I had a dream you were still here. You had this goofy, awestruck look on your face, like maybe you’d just seen a double rainbow or a bobcat in the wild or a field of yellow blanket flowers, like the lot behind our house before they built the new subdivision. And I realized just now, after all this time, you were looking at me.

I have a confession: I have been afraid my whole life.

She did not choose to be born, but she chose, in this moment, to live.